


No Harm in Looking

by prettybrilliantfunny



Category: Critical Role (Web Series)
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-04-16
Updated: 2019-04-16
Packaged: 2020-01-14 21:13:09
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,096
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18484471
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/prettybrilliantfunny/pseuds/prettybrilliantfunny
Summary: It’s easy in a way that not many things have been easy in his life.  To watch Fjord. Tolethimself watch Fjord.





	No Harm in Looking

It’s easy in a way that not many things have been easy in his life.  To watch Fjord. To _let himself_ watch Fjord.  There is, of course, the loose slip of his accent too often to go unnoticed by even the least astute among them (Beauregard), and the vomiting of sea-water four hundred miles from the coast that begins to draw more concern and less and less jokes (Nott).  And the ancient godling horror that has apparently wrapped their charming, half-tusked warlock in its coils.

 But who is Caleb to judge.

Nott pilfers three gold from the half-orc’s coin purse, several tankards of ale making the lift sloppy by her standards but all but unnoticeable by anyone else, but Fjord catches Caleb’s eye when she does it.  The corner of his mouth curls, the faintest flash of teeth, and it drills straight through Caleb’s chest, a twisting spiral of heat that feels too little like a danger of one kind and far more like another. Caleb won’t be the one the blink; at a distance, even he can be brave. For all that he _watches_ , there are moments where Fjord is as unreadable to him as Infernal.  But he knows a devil when he sees one.

The moment ends. Fjord turns back to Jester, her arms flailing in the middle of a story, and Nott skitters off to the bar with a wicked laugh.  It takes more of an effort than usual to turn his head, to watch her instead (she’s almost dwarfed by the height of the barstools but it’s their third night at the inn and she vaults one easily, slapping the coins onto the faded wood with a practiced demand).  He can feel his gaze at the back of his neck, like a hand pressing a thumb to his throat, to the wild flutter of his pulse. The weakest part of him begs him to turn, that part of him that craves without thinking--that would draw him like a moth to the flame. Instead, he pulls the copper wire from his sleeve and curls it in the palm of his hand, comforted by the familiar ease as the cantrip slips from him. 

_What was it Molly said--not to steal from happy people,_ ja _?_

He sees the soft message land--Nott’s shoulder blades pulling together as though the reproach lays along her spine.  An indecipherable string of huffs and growls and a single expletive in Halfling is all that filters back to him before the magical connection fades.

There’s still so much the group doesn’t know--about each other, about the horrors of the past that dog so many of their steps--and even in those foolish (hopeful) moments where he finds the bravery to speak, he bites his tongue, uncertain whether the life he half-remembers is even his own.  He wants, _needs_ this arrangement to work--but how does he explain the empty spaces, the _years_ that stretch back and back with nothing to fill them, nothing to connect them to him at all.  (He’s not even sure how old he is.)

And yet---Fjord understands.  He _knows_ .  What it’s like to be so certain, only to have that hubris shattered in an instant, to have everything change.  He knows what it is like to wake up _different_ and not know why.  That was the reason why, when Beau made some snide comment over Jester’s loud protests, Fjord’s bark of laughter caught just behind Caleb’s ribs.  It hooked in like a claw, insistent in its painful, aching comfort. He was no stranger to sympathetic magic--the draw of like to like, even across great distance.  Both spellcasters, their histories. A resonance, that was all.

Nott slaps three gold on the tavern table between the trio, startling all of them.  “Be grateful!” she snaps, with all the charisma of a manticore.

“Ooo, Fjord!” Jester gushes, her accent dancing along her curiosity. “Did you drop these?”

“Must’ve done,” he murmurs.  His lips curling up as he appraises Nott, still fuming next to the table. “Much appreciated. Thank you, Nott.”

There were such creatures, of course--that could petrify, or hypnotize with a look--so many that only his keen mind could have kept them all separate. There are times when Fjord’s gaze feels like that. Deeper than a charm or a trifling suggestion. _Visceral_. However afixed Caleb might feel by the look Fjord casts in his direction now, he is not bewitched.  There is something searching and then settling in those amber eyes, as if he’s just learned something about Caleb he hadn’t known he was divulging.

The goblin makes a sound of disgust, and jabs a finger at the warlock.  (The connection broken, Caleb runs a rough hand across his face, feeling for whatever expression might have betrayed him). “Caleb’s the leader--and don’t you forget it!”

“Geezus, Nott!” Beau’s half-growl is exasperated. “We’re all fucking adults, we don’t need a goddamn _leader_.”

Nott’s face takes on a shrewd expression. “Are you happy?” she demands, and not even Beau misses the way the goblin’s fingers twitch eagerly--so quick to snatch a button, or a purse.  

The monk’s eyes narrow.  “Don’t even think about it.”

The two squint suspiciously at one another for a moment or two before Nott sniffs, turning up her nose dismissively. “I don’t know what you’re talking about,” she replies before skulking away from the table.

“ _Danke_ ,” Caleb murmurs as she comes near; grateful, truly.  He’s pulled out a book, but he holds his place for her with a finger--gives her his full attention. She flushes--a deep green at the tip of her ears--and squeezes his hand.  She scrunches herself into the corner beside him and even with the entire tavern between them, she drops her sharp voice to a whisper.

“I think it’s fine to steal from Fuhjord,” she insists, intentionally over-pronouncing his name.

Caleb shakes his head, resisting the urge to smile with fondness. “ _Nein_ . We are a group now, _ja_? Best behaviors.”

“He’s always staring at you,” Nott grumbles. “Like he’s so sneaky.”

It takes every ounce of his will not to turn around.

“ _I_ think he’s up to something, Caleb.”

“Is that so?” He murmurs faintly, too quietly for Nott who is already moving on to other things--how nice Jester smells, how fun it will be to steal some of Beauregards shiny shurikens, just because.  And Caleb let’s the weight of Fjord’s gaze press into his shoulders, hot and grinding; let’s him watch and watch, and doesn’t once look up.


End file.
